3rd International YDYS Conference

22-25 May 2024, Universität Hamburg, Germany

This year’s Yoga Darśana, Yoga Sādhana Conference: ‘Introspection, Inspiration, Institutionalisation’ was co-sponsored by the Department for Culture and History of India and Tibet at Universität Hamburg and the provisional Yoga Studies Research Network (YSRN). Building on the success of previous conferences in 2016 and 2022 at Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland, this third iteration of YDYS brought together approximately 100 scholars in the field of yoga studies for three days of inspiring presentations, dynamic discussions, and critical examination of the field.

Opening day began with scholars from around the world gathering in the main conference room for tea, coffee, and casual conversations. The energy and excitement grew as folks reconnected with old friends or met colleagues in person for the first time. Groups gathered around Dr. Seth Powell, founder of the online platform Yogic Studies; Dr. Christopher Chapple, director of the Master of Arts in Yoga Studies at Loyola Marymount University; Dr. Jason Birch and Jacqueline Hargreaves of the SOAS Centre for Yoga Studies; Dr. Suzanne Newcombe and Dr. Theo Wildcroft of the Open University; and Dr. Adrián Muñoz founder and head of Proyecto YoLA on Yoga in Latin America, offering a sampling of the communities that were present at this year’s YDYS. 

At 16:15 pm our program officially began with a welcome address from Prof. Harunaga Isaacson at the Universität Hamburg and a keynote address from Prof. James Mallinson, Boden Professor of Sanskrit at Oxford University, entitled “Yoga Turned on its Head: Inverted Postures and the Realignment of Yogic Practice c. 1000 CE.” Following the keynote, many attended a shared dinner at a vegan restaurant, Citta Izakaya, and presentations began the following day.

Presentations were organized into panels around this year’s themes:

• 1) Introspection – exploring the historical, philosophical, psychological, and experiential aspects of yoga;
• 2) Inspiration – investigating the influences of yoga on artistic, literary, and cultural expressions from ancient to present day societies; and
• 3) Institutionalisation – examining the historical and structural dimensions of yoga traditions’ social formations.

Across these themes, I was most impressed with papers that presented new ways of thinking about the complex relationships among gender, race, and yoga, yoga and nationalism, and yoga and social justice, advancing the subfield of critical yoga studies. I highlight three such papers below.

In “Postured: Women, Nation, and Yoga in Twentieth Century India,” Ida Pajunen contributed new insights into the ways “women, nation and yoga are interdependent, co-constructed ideas.” Examining texts on yoga (specifically āsana and prāņāyāma) from the 1920s and 1930s, Pajunen effectively argued that yoga “became a practice of health at the same time women became signifiers of nation,” which gives us greater socio-political understanding of how the demographics of yoga practitioners shifted away from only high caste men in service of nation building and eugenics.

In “Omwashing Yoga: The Far-Right’s Weaponization of Spirituality Toward Ethnonationalism,” Dr. Sheena Sood spoke about “Omwashing” the use of yoga by far-right political entities in the 21st century, specifically in India, Israel, and the United States, “to mask state violence and divert the gaze from their supremacist agendas.” Timely and important, this paper added significantly to the conference, inviting conversations around decolonizing yoga, which are very present in the yoga practitioner space but still absent in many scholarly yoga studies spaces.

In “Playing the Blame Game: A Critique of Neoliberal, Trauma-Informed, Prison Yoga,” Rose Parkes built on the work of my PhD supervisor, Dr. Farah Godrej, examining the beliefs of Prison Yoga Teachers (PYTs) in the UK. Parkes has found that prison yoga projects and PYTs in the UK “may foster imprisoned people’s docility and compliance” and “are at risk of institutionalisation rather than being a practice to promote social justice, structural transformation and liberation.” She quoted Godrej in her conclusion stating, “Allowing yoga to remain a coping mechanism, a tool to make prison look like a better place – that would contradict yogic nonviolence. Educating people on how inaction is harming may make them take action” (2022: 262). 

There were a total of 83 papers presented covering a range of topics including, but not limited to, Tantra, Sanskrit, Yogic Philosophy, Kuņdalinī, Jain Yoga, Mantra and Sound, Yoga Therapy, and Psychedelics. Additional evening activities included a screening of “Breath of the Gods – A Journey to the Origins of Modern Yoga” and conversation with the director on Wednesday, and a second keynote address “Drawing Lessons: Artistic Practice, Institutions, and Introspection in Modern South Asia” by Dr. Sonal Khullar. The conference concluded with a Closing Discussion where we expressed gratitude to this year’s organizers and hosts, shared what we learned from gathering this year, and started to make plans for next time. 

The 4th International Yoga Darśana, Yoga Sādhana Conference will take place in 2026. I look forward to seeing you there!